zero plus nothing equals - 4. the desert

by jeremy witherington

part four of 31

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> ' billy jones woke up. he rolled over and went back to sleep he had a dream in which he was walking down a dark road. the road led to a desert and continued across the desert. a mountain loomed on the horizon and the road pointed to it. what is the point, billy wondered, of putting a road across the desert pointing to a mountain when you can see the mountain for yourself and just head for it. he soon got his answer. the road stopped and there was nothing but sand between him and the mountain. the sand got in his boots. the boots he had paid five silver dollars for back in tombstone. just so folks would think he was billy the kid, not just plain old billy jones. but it had not worked out. people just laughed at him. he tried to join the smith gang, but they just laughed at him and called him a punk and a tenderfoot. he didn’t know what a punk was, but he was no tenderfoot. he asked mister henry morgan, the proprietor of the general store, if he could get a job sweeping up, but mister morgan just laughed at him. he told ernestine fallover, the clerk at mister morgan’s store and the prettiest gal in town that she was the prettiest gal in town and she did not exactly laugh at him but just said - yes of course i am the prettiest girl in town, who else did you have in mind? and buck bangover and grandpa givens over at the stove and the cracker barrel laughed fit to bust. and now he had sand in his boots! billy woke up. it was stil dark. he did not know how long he had been awake. or how long he had been alive. trapped in this town. trapped on this planet. hunted down like a gorilla escaped from the circus. in the wind and rain. across the desert. with the moon behind a cloud and sand in his boots. next